


Child Discretely

by crimsonkitty



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Naruto
Genre: Angst, Boggarts, Crossover, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-10
Updated: 2017-03-10
Packaged: 2018-09-30 17:00:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 601
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10167641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crimsonkitty/pseuds/crimsonkitty
Summary: His own face is staring back at him.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I've read just about every Kakashi goes to Hogwarts fic under the sun and while many of them are fantastic, I've always had a different image of what Kakashi's boggart would be than anything I've read so far. So I decided to write it. I picture Kakashi being about fifteen in this. Please enjoy but also please heed the tags. No beta and I'm posting this at midnight so I'm sorry if it's actually terrible.
> 
> Title inspired by “Lifeforms” by Daughter
> 
> _Well you can try to sink down deeply / And find the children lost at sea / Find the children who discretely / Were killed in infancy_

His own face is staring back at him. 

The boggart as an exercise had intrigued Kakashi during Lupin’s initial explanation. A creature that could inspire fear by merely existing. By merely being in its presence. Many a shinobi had tried and failed at achieving something that the boggart did by simply being alive. 

The fears of the other third years are grotesquely tame in nature, though Kakashi will give them credit for imagination. For spiders and snarling teachers and severed limbs that don’t do much more than toddle around blindly. 

But now.

Now it’s Kakashi’s face staring back at him. 

It’s not a perfect copy. The boggart image is dressed in his usual ANBU garb, the white armor and the black leg wrappings instead of the cumbersome Hogwarts uniform. There is no hitai-ate pulled down over one eye and the sharingan is open, black dots spinning lazily around the red pupil. 

Kakashi regards it with outright curiosity. He genuinely hadn’t known what to expect when he’d stepped to the front of the line. What is it that Sharingan no Kakashi desperately fears above all else. He can’t say he hasn’t wondered.

“What is this?” he asks the image, unsure whether it understands him. Lupin had never mentioned any kind of sentience beyond an ability to invade the target’s mind. 

In response, boggart Kakashi puts a hand over its shoulder, unsheathing the sword across its back. The sword twirls in its hand for a moment before being held out between them, presented for Kakashi to take. 

Kakashi stares into the eyes of his double. The boggart stares back, masked image focusing intently. The sharingan continues to spiral. 

“No.” Kakashi shakes his head in refusal. He will not take the sword. Doesn’t know if he even could. It’s an identical match to the one locked in a trunk up in the third year dorm room. 

The boggart does not move or blink or change its expression. When it speaks, Kakashi can barely recognize the rasping voice as his own. 

“You know what you have to do.” 

There is blood dripping from the blade, from the hand holding onto the sharp edge instead of the handle. The imagined sharingan is crying red. 

The boggart’s hand does not waver and Kakashi, against every hard won instinct, finds himself drawn towards it. He reaches out, transfixed by the sound of it dripping. Perhaps the sword will answer his questions. 

There are gasps of horror behind him, even a small scream, the students noticing even before Kakashi the dark red stain spreading across the boggart’s stomach, like a slow sucking wound. 

The panic begins to rise in his chest and his throat along with a terrible understanding. 

He wouldn’t. He swore it. He _swore_ it. Over his father’s grave. 

The puddle of red at the boggart’s feet grows and grows, until it just barely reaches the soles of Kakashi’s feet. 

I will not be weak. I will not be like you. 

“I won’t,” he tells the boggart. Desperation is creeping in around the edges of his mind. Desperation and a want so strong it chokes him. His double doesn’t seem to hear. Doesn’t seem to notice.

“I won’t,” he says. Louder this time, against the howling of the sword. Shouts it, spinning the words into a splintering shield. 

You are your father’s son, the blood tells him. The single dark eye says mockingly. 

The blood is on his hands and on his knees, soaking high into his robes. Kakashi looks up. 

_I won’t_ , he whispers or thinks or prays.

There’s no one left to find his body.

**Author's Note:**

> God I hope that wasn't terrible. For what it's worth, I've always thought of Kakashi as a slytherin. Come say hi over at [kaqueershi](http://kaqueershi.tumblr.com/).


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